


Before the Beat Kicks In

by skarlatha



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: First Kiss, First Time, Grown Men Acting Like Teenagers, M/M, Movie Night, Prison setting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-18
Updated: 2015-07-18
Packaged: 2018-04-09 23:30:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4368488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skarlatha/pseuds/skarlatha
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s movie night at the prison, and everybody is piled up in the library watching <i>Ghost Rider</i>. Well, most people are watching <i>Ghost Rider</i>. Rick, on the other hand, is a little distracted by the fact that Daryl seems to be getting a little handsy under the blanket they're sharing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Before the Beat Kicks In

**Author's Note:**

> As always, lots of credit goes to my tireless beta, Michelle_A_Emerlind, and my cheerleader, TWDObsessive, for their comments and encouragements. You guys are both at LEAST fifty different flavors of awesome. The title is from the song "Sing" by Ed Sheeran.

Glenn finishes rigging up the projector and turns around to look at the group. “Are we ready?”

Tyreese raises his hand. “Final petition to change movies?”

Hershel sighs. “On what grounds?”

“It might scare the children.”

Rick snorts, pulling the thick plush blanket he’d liberated from a Bed Bath and Beyond over his lap and settling down into the loveseat at the back of the room. “There are rotting corpses at the gates trying to eat us. I think the kids can handle a Nicholas Cage movie.”

Glenn nods. “So... we’re ready then?”

“Still a few people missing. We should wait a few more minutes,” Rick says, and there’s a murmur of agreement from the adults and a chorus of disappointment from the children.

Sasha walks in and starts to sit down beside Rick on the loveseat. Rick points at a chair across the room. Sasha sighs and walks over to the chair.

Bob pushes open the door. “What did I miss?” he asks as he turns to lower himself into the empty space at Rick’s side. “Missed the empty seat beside Dr. S,” Rick grumbles, and Bob moves there.

Michonne enters the room and flops down beside Rick. He literally growls at her. She rolls her eyes super hard and then moves to sit beside Carol.

And then Daryl walks in. Rick scoots over to give him more room. Daryl sits down.

“Okay,” Glenn says. “Is that everybody? Can we start?” No one protests this time, so he presses play and cuddles up next to Maggie in an oversized beanbag chair they’d brought back from the same BB&B as Rick’s blanket.

“How were the traps?” Rick murmurs to Daryl.

“Good. A few rabbits. Couple possums. Ain’t skinned ‘em yet but they’ll be alright until after the movie.” Daryl shifts in his seat, his thigh moving to press against Rick’s just slightly. “How was farming?”

“Have some bell peppers that are almost ready,” Rick says. He snuggles in to his blanket a little more and smiles. “Glad you’re back.”

Daryl rolls his eyes hard enough that Rick can see it out of his peripheral vision. “Always c--”

“ _SHHH_ ,” Mika hisses from the group of kids closest to the blank wall they’re using as a projection screen. The little girl turns around and glares at them and Daryl mutters a “sorry” while Rick gives her a sheepish smile.

After she turns back around, Daryl leans in a little closer, his ice-cold bare arms brushing against Rick’s skin. “Always come back, don’t I?” he whispers.

“Jesus, you’re cold,” Rick says, tugging the blanket out of the spaces where it’s tucked around his waist and pulling it up to his shoulders before offering half of it to Daryl. “Blanket’s big enough for two. Warm up before your teeth start chattering.”

Daryl laughs softly but accepts the offer of the blanket. “Mika would hate that, wouldn’t she?”

“Mmm,” Rick agrees, then wriggles around under the pretense of re-situating his part of the blanket even though he knows full well that he’s moving to get more contact between his body and Daryl’s. He’s not sure what that means in a practical sense, but he knows what it means in an IMpractical one, and it has to do with the strange thoughts and ideas that sneak up on him at night when he’s got his hand around his own cock trying to think about sexy blonde women with lipstick and perfect breasts and instead comes harder than ever when he accidentally starts imagining short messy hair and hard muscle and the scent of the forest.

But that’s _incredibly_ impractical, Rick tells himself, and not just because he’s fairly certain that the Daryl in his dreams has at least six hands and no gag reflex at all, and he’s also pretty sure that if he actually had Daryl in his bed and looked down to watch his cock sliding in to Daryl’s body like that, he’d blow his load before he even got the tip of it in because _damn_ , that sounds amazing.

Rick shivers, and Daryl looks over at him. “You alright?”

“Fine,” Rick says, and shifts just that little bit closer so that their sides are pressed together, from their shoulders all the way down their torsos and their thighs. Daryl’s skin is already warmer, already causing Rick’s own skin to tingle from the contact even through clothing, and ten minutes into the movie he’s already been hard as a rock for at least nine and a half of those minutes.

“How long is this movie?” Rick murmurs to Daryl, surreptitiously shifting the blanket to keep anyone from noticing he has a tent so big that it could probably qualify as a blanket fort all on its own.

“You in a hurry to get somewhere?” Daryl turns his head and looks over at Rick with a twinkle in his eye and just the very corners of his mouth tilted upward.

Their hands are close together, lying on their own respective thighs with their pinky fingers just barely not touching. Rick swallows hard. “Nah,” he breathes, turning his attention back to the screen.

Another ten minutes pass and Rick hasn’t processed a single line of dialogue from the movie as all of his attention is devoted to the heat passing through the millimeter of space between their fingers. And also to his sizable erection, which is now legitimately _throbbing_. He hopes that the movie isn’t more than four hours long because then he might be medically required to talk to Hershel about it, and no good can come of that.

At twenty-five minutes in, Daryl’s hand moves very slightly, and there’s skin-to-skin contact and Rick lets out a long, shaky breath and tries to control his thoughts with very little success. He’s pretty sure that Nick Cage’s character is some sort of, like, supernatural creature or something and maybe there’s something to do with the devil, but that’s about all he’s gotten from the movie so far. He can, however, tell you the exact curve of Daryl’s biceps and the exact rhythm of Daryl’s breathing and exactly how many teeth are on the zipper of his own jeans.  

At thirty-seven minutes in, Daryl leans over and says something in his ear about--fuck, Rick doesn’t even know. Something about how that’s not how you’re supposed to ride a motorcycle, maybe, or possibly he’s reciting the Preamble to the Constitution or explaining Schrödinger’s cat or who the hell knows what else. But what matters is that it’s Daryl’s voice, deep and rough and right the fuck by his ear, so close that Daryl’s lips _almost_ brush his earlobe and so instead of processing the words, Rick just whispers, “Are you gay?”  

Daryl pulls back a little and raises an eyebrow at Rick. “What?” he whispers, but he doesn’t seem offended or disgusted, just… surprised.

“I mean…” Rick swallows, looks down at his lap. “I mean if a guy hit on you, what would you do?”

Daryl’s quiet for several seconds, then he looks back at the movie and shrugs, his shoulder sliding against Rick’s. “Depends on the guy, I guess.”

Rick lifts his pinky finger and loops it around Daryl’s. Daryl smiles, his eyes still on the projection on the wall, and twists his hand around to press their palms together. He slowly twines their fingers and gives Rick’s hand a little squeeze. Rick’s throat goes dry as he starts to frantically catalogue the way Daryl’s strong hand feels in his in case the spell is broken when the movie is over and they never go back to this again.

“Thinkin’ too hard about this,” Daryl murmurs after a few seconds. He squeezes Rick’s hand again and leans back over to put his lips next to Rick’s ear. “You ain’t even watchin’ the movie anymore.”

Rick lets out a breathy huff of laughter. “Never really was.”

“Why not?”

Rick opens his mouth to respond but is immediately cut off by Carol turning around to hiss at them for talking. Daryl lets go of Rick’s hand to pull his own out from under the blanket, then flips Carol off with a smirk. Rick whimpers very quietly at the loss of Daryl’s fingers, but he doesn’t have much time to feel sad about it before Daryl’s hand slips back under the blanket and heads straight between Rick’s legs.

“ _Shit_ ,” Rick hisses, and Daryl chuckles very softly as he presses his hand harder against Rick’s hard cock.

“Think you can be quiet?” the archer murmurs into Rick’s ear as he carefully unbuckles Rick’s belt with one hand, moving slowly enough that the telltale metallic clinking isn’t loud enough for others to hear.

Rick’s eyes dart around the room, but everyone else seems totally engrossed in the movie and nobody seems to have noticed at all that Daryl freakin’ Dixon is unbuttoning Rick’s jeans and sliding his hand inside.

Thank God for blankets, is all Rick can say.

The first touch of Daryl’s fingers to Rick’s skin is the crackle of lightning in the hot Georgia sky and Rick swears he smells ozone, and if lust is rain then Daryl is a goddamn flash flood and Rick lifts his hips just slightly into the current and lets himself be swept away by it.   

Daryl’s hand is dry and calloused but strong and damn does he move it just perfectly over Rick’s length. Rick lets out a breathy little sound that he just barely manages to keep from becoming a moan, and Daryl murmurs “easy, Rick” and tightens his fingers around the other man’s shaft.  

Rick does moan this time, then hurriedly shifts his facial features into an exaggerated yawn in case the sound causes anyone to turn around.

Which Glenn does, and he grins over his shoulder back at them. “We need to do a hand check back there?” he asks, waggling his eyebrows.

“You insinuatin’ somethin’, Korea?” Daryl growls at him, raising his own eyebrows in challenge at the same time that he slides his thumb over the slit at the tip of Rick’s cock. Rick bites down on his bottom lip to keep from arching up off the couch, and after what seems like absolutely _forever_ , Glenn finally rolls his eyes and turns back to the movie.   

“You’re gonna kill me,” Rick says, half-whimper and half-speech. He squirms in his seat as Daryl strokes him, steady and tight and perfect.

Daryl huffs out a quiet laugh and squeezes the base of Rick’s cock. “Now why would I kill you when keepin’ you alive gets me this--” another squeeze “--in my mouth later?”   

Rick’s hips _do_ buck upward that time, and his head falls back onto the back of the loveseat. “Jesus Christ, Daryl, I’m gonna come--” There’s a strangled cough from Tyreese, who’s sitting just a few feet away with Karen. Rick digs his fingernails into Daryl’s thigh and squeaks out: “--with you to check the snares… tomorrow… morning…”   

“That’s cool, Rick,” Daryl says, infuriatingly evenly. “Come whenever you want.” He drags his fingers up the shaft and thumbs over Rick’s slit again. “To check the snares, I mean.” 

Tyreese gives a snort. “Get a cell, you guys.”

“What the fuck you talkin’ about, Ty?” Daryl snaps. “We’re just talkin’ about the snares.” He strokes faster and Rick digs his fingernails in harder, imagining the moon-shaped bruises he’ll find on the hunter’s thigh later when he takes Daryl’s jeans off and puts his mouth there, and he’s vaguely aware that Carol is admonishing everyone to shut up during the movie, but he can’t be sure of her exact words because with one more twist of Daryl’s wrist he’s coming, biting his bottom lip hard enough to draw blood in an effort to keep from yelling out his release in a room full of family.

Daryl keeps stroking slowly until Rick hisses under his breath at the drag of fingertips on his over-sensitive skin. Rick sags into the loveseat and stares at the movie without processing any of the images while his heart rate gradually returns to normal. He bats Daryl’s hand away and tucks himself back into his pants, carefully re-zipping and buckling his belt back up while he tries to regulate his breathing.

And then, just when Rick thinks everything is under control again, Daryl pulls his hand out from under the blanket and starts licking his fingers absently, sucking on them one-by-one, and he’s so fucking _casual_ about it, sucking Rick’s come off of his skin like it’s normal, like it isn’t the filthiest thing Rick’s ever seen in his life. Rick feels his pupils dilate again and he lunges at Daryl, grabbing the man’s chin and forcing it over so that they’re facing each other before he leans in to kiss Daryl hungrily.   

Daryl puts his hands on Rick’s cheeks--one hand dry and cool, the other hot and damp with spit and come--and Rick whimpers and licks his way into Daryl’s mouth, shifting his body to lean over the archer slightly, to cover Daryl’s body with his own as best he can without actually climbing over him.

“Holy shit,” Carl exclaims. “ _DAD_. _EW._ ”  

Daryl chuckles, a husky sound that really shouldn’t turn Rick on so much when he’s just been caught making out like a teenager _by_ a teenager who happens to be his son. “Ain’t like you never seen kissin’ before, kiddo,” Daryl rumbles.

“Yeah, but that’s my _dad_ and he’s _old_ ,” Carl says, rubbing his eyes with the heels of his hands like he’s trying to grind out the sight of his father with his tongue down someone’s throat.

Rick ducks his head and covers his face with his hands, but Daryl just swings an arm around his shoulders. “I don’t know,” Daryl says. “ _I_ think he’s pretty hot.”

“Oh my god,” Carl mumbles. “That’s so disgusting. My father is not--” air quotes “-- _hot_.”

“Can we _PLEASE_ just _watch the movie_?” Lizzie yells from the kid group at the front of the room. “Nobody _cares_ that a bunch of _old people_ are _being gross_.”

There’s a murmur of agreement from all of the kids, who turn around as a group and give Rick and Daryl the most intense stink-eyes that Rick has ever witnessed.

“Sorry,” Rick says, blushing so hard he’s sure it’s visible even in the darkness. “Carry on.”

Daryl whips the blanket off of them and stands up. “We’re just gonna go check the snares,” he says, then holds out a hand for Rick. “Comin’, Rick?”

“Hell yeah,” Rick says, and he takes Daryl’s hand to the sound of Nicholas Cage’s voice and a chorus of _ewww_ from the entire prison family.

**Author's Note:**

> I have two more chapters planned for this, but this stands alone well enough for now. We'll see if I get around to writing the others. 
> 
> Also, I eat comments for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. You don't want me to starve to death, do you? :)
> 
>  
> 
> [Talk to me on Tumblr!](http://skarlatha.tumblr.com)


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